Introducing Drahul Dravid

Yes, it is official now. Rahul Sharad Dravid, the ace Indian cricketer has officially changed his name to Drahul Dravid. Drahul called a media conference yesterday and announced this to the world. A few days back, Rahul Dravid and his family had gone to their native temple in Indore, Madhya Pradesh for this name-changing ceremony.

Rahul was very emotional about this ceremony and he wanted to attend the function in his Indian cricket wear. As seen in the picture above, the moment the priest confirmed that the name had been changed, Drahul burst into tears. Few of his Indian cricket team colleagues (who wanted to remain unnamed) also attended the ceremony. When asked on why he started crying after this ceremony, Drahul said that the thing that worried him the most was the expense that his fans have to go through to purchase posters of him with the new name. Drahul also said that once the IPL was finished, Drahul would personally add the D to all his posters owned by his fans, as he felt that he would anyway have nothing else to do after the IPL finishes.

Drahul also said that numerological or astrological reasons were not behind this name change. He said that he had to change the name to indicate clearly his style of cricket. He didn't want his name to be just because selectors thought that he could play an aggressive style of cricket. Drahul also said that he had always learnt batting as an art form where the face of the bat should point towards the pitch such that the ball, on hitting the bat, falls within the pitch (and within half a metre of the batsman) and rolls to a stop within a metre. (Given below is a photo where Rahul Dravid was expressing his frustration because of Sachin Tendulkar's inability to understand this concept)

He said that this talent was limited to very few cricketers around the world and this is the talent required to produce a draw in test cricket. So, by changing his name from Rahul to Drahul, he was clearly communicating that he should be included in the squad only if the required result was a draw. He also added that his dad had recognised this talent in him the moment he was born and hence put Dravid as his last name. But the world had failed to see the draw in dravid and that is why he had to change his first name to drahul to double-emphasize. Drahul felt that this name change would bring about a change in his image.

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South Africa beat Bermuda in ICC women's cricket with 296 balls to spare

Anyone who knows a bit of cricket must be astonished to see "with 296 balls to spare". Yes, it is true. In yesterday's ICC world cup women's qualifying match between South Africa and Bermuda, Bermuda women batted first and played for 18 overs to score .... 13 runs! Of these 13 runs, 10 were from extras!
Usually commentators would say "Only three of their batsmen managed to go into double figures", but here they had to say"Only three of their batswomen managed to get off the mark with each of them scoring 1".
The South African women finished off the match in 4 balls (from the only over bowled) that included 9 wides and 1 no ball. Probably, the women from Bermuda were learning cricket during this game.
The scorecard from the game can be found here.

Btw, have you seen the new cheerleader costume for the Mumbai Indians after the existing one was banned by the moral police? Check out the exclusive photos here. If you didn't manage to get the scoop behind the monkey-calling episode of Harbhajan and Symonds, check out the research done by the lawyers of Harbhajan here.

Yuvraj Singh hits six sixers in an over

First, it was Herschelle Gibbs, now it is our very own Yuvraj Singh. It was the penultimate over of the Indian innings and god only knows what came over Yuvraj Singh, he just broke loose hitting poor Stuart Broad for six sixes in the over. In case you missed the India England match yesterday, you can watch the video of Yuvraj Singh hitting six sixers here.

All you Singhs/Sardars/both, it is party time. Go ahead, shed your apprehensions, raise your hands and dance!

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What more ? New Coach ?

What more does the Indian Team want? The Indian team wants Whatmore. I am worried by the current trend of demands put forth by the Indian team. They want more perks, they want the restrictions on the number of ads they can appear removed, they want more salaries and now they want whatmore!

This is ridiculous. What more can a cricket board provide for its players?

Whatless, a 21 yr old woman from Trinidad and Tobago was shocked at the way the Indian cricket team played their game in the world cup and now, when she heard that they wanted whatmore, she burst out into profanities and even composed a song extempore.

Dude, this is a song by whatless,

for a cricket team which is toothless!

When ur bowlers bowl the ball,

it gets hit to the next-door mall.

when ur batsman face west-indies

they start peeing in their undies!

How dare you ask for what more?

In fact, you won't even get whatless!

Whatmore, on hearing this song, had words of praise for whatless and even proposed marriage to her and wanted to raise "more or less" a family.

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Sri Lanka beat New Zealand to reach ICC cricket world cup final

With an excellent century by the captain Mahela Jayawardene, Sri Lanka cruised to a 81 run victory in their semi-final clash against New Zealand, thus booking themselves a place in this Sunday's world cup final clash.

Yesterday's century by Jayawardene was not only an important captain's knock, but an example of how a batsman should pace his innings. When i reached home and switched on the TV, i saw that he had scored 39 runs of 60 balls. The situation didn't look so good then, though they had a run-rate of around 4.5. But, as the innings progressed, jayawardane's strike rate slowly increased to almost run-a-ball and before the New Zealander's could realise it, he had ensured that Sri Lanka would get to a good total by partnering more than 100 runs in the last 10 overs.

The first few overs of the New Zeland innings were entertaining to watch with the control of vaas and the unplayable swinging deliveries of Lasith Malinga. Everyone was having a smile, including the batsmen, who were moving their bats in all possible directions in an attempt to make contact with the ball, only to find out that it had long reached the wicketkeeper!

Every match in the world cup seems to have a negative fallout. After this match, Stephen Fleming, one of the most successful captains in present day cricket, announced that he is stepping down as the one-day captain of New Zealand. He had shown to the cricketing world that even without superstars in your side, smart cricket can win you matches.

Srilankans have more than 3 days off to prepare for their title clash against the winners of South Africa and Australia, which in all probability, going by their current indomitable form, is Australia!

Some images from the match:

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Indian Team Manager to back Chappell's asses

so says NDTV's sports section.

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Split Wide Open

Yes, this might sound like Britney Spears' act or any other celebrity trying to emulate Britney Spears in order to grab the front page, but this is not so. This is the sorry state of Indian Cricket today.

With the Indian Cricket League being announced today by the Essar Group and the BCCI immediately putting it down, a big clash of the titans is in store for Indian Cricket and in all probability, only Indian Cricket will be the loser.

Probably for the first time, Sachin speaks out defending himself against the comments of Greg Chappell. In his interview to Times of India (TOI) he says:

"I have given my heart and my soul for 17 years. No coach had mentioned even in passing that my attitude was not correct. Cricket has been my life for all these years and will always be. Again, it's not that we are defending ourselves. We do realise that we played badly and, as a team, we take full responsibility for that.But what hurt us most is that the coach has questioned our attitude."

This was in response to the coach Greg Chappell's accusations that the senior team members often teamed up against his and Dravid's decisions. Milind Rege, former Ranji Captain says that:

It is completely out of control. Indian Cricket is in a mess right now and unless and until the BCCI come strongly with decisions that are for the players to accept, for the selectors to accept, for those who control cricket to accept, Indian Cricket is going to head for serious trouble.

Definitely not a good direction to head in, for Indian Cricket. Ok, they lost to Bangladesh and were kicked out of the world cup. Lets just forget it as just another match and move on. The way the politicians and the media are hyping this issue, it looks like Indian cricket will take a u-turn and head Zimbabwe's way, into oblivion. Please, let it not happen like that!

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Indian Cricket League to be formed

Yesterday, Essel group chairman Subhash Chandra announced the formation of a cricket league. This would be called the Indian Cricket League, comprising a total of six teams, with each team consisting of upto four international players. This league also plans to setup cricketing academies throughout India and create a talent pool for India Cricket.
But, how far will this venture be a success is anyone's guess with the BCCI already slamming this idea and pronouncing it an unfruitful venture. Everyone wants a share of the lucrative Indian cricket scene and it is obvious that groups are unwilling to co-operate for cricket's sake!

It is rumoured that some big names in Indian and international cricket have already been signed on for this league. Lets hope that this turns to be like the English county matches and we get more people to watch these matches than the usual entourage of friends and family who are the only ones to turn up at Ranji matches.

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Sachin tendulkar should retire

so says Ian Chappell. He writes an article titled "Look into that mirror, Sachin" and goes on to write:

If Tendulkar had found an honest mirror three years ago and asked the question; "Mirror, mirror on the wall who is the best batsman of all?" It would've answered; "Brian Charles Lara." If he asked that same mirror right now; "Mirror, mirror on the wall should I retire?" The answer would be; "Yes."

Maybe, he wanted to imply that the writing was on the wall for Sachin and he preferred not to be so harsh on the little master.

But, is it really time for Sachin to retire ? I don't mind that he doesn't score hundreds like before or even that he doesn't tear into the opposition like he used to do. Even if he spends a short time at the crease, the shots he plays and the strokes he makes are a connoisseur's delight. But, I am worried that one day he might just disappear like Mark Waugh. I would definitely love to see him walking off, for the last time, with a 100,000 indian fans giving him a standing ovation. So, i hope that he chooses a forthcoming big series in india to take this big decision.

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Spare the Indian Cricket team

The Indian cricket team has been at the receiving end for the past few days after its unceremonious exit from the ICC World Cup. If you had watched Star News (No sane English speaking person would watch it, but there was some other program on NDTV at that time) over the past few days, the way they were bashing the cricketers made you feel sorry for them. Is this outcry justified ?

Yes, they performed badly. But, they are human, not the demigods which we Indian cricket fans perceive them to be. They too have their bad days and it was one such day which led them to the defeat against Bangladesh.

Everyone wants their share of criticism and uses their creative minds to bash the Indian team. Anand Ramachandran says that the Indian Cricket team has applied for Irish citizenship so that they can continue to play in the Super-8 as part of the Irish team. There are even some super-smart people who file cases against the Indian cricket team coach Greg Chappell, BCCI President Sharad Pawar and Kiran More, blaming them for the ouster of the Indian cricket team from the World Cup. Some people, with the support of political parties, burn the posters and effigies of our cricketers and also chant anti "ruling-government" slogans randomly during this act. There is also this mail going around with photos of the indian cricketers in their new jobs (The dhoni one with the monkey was cool!)

But, are the Indian cricketers really responsible for this loss? People are hasty in making conclusions about the inabilities of our cricketers. Not enough analysis is done by the media before making outrageous statements about the form of our team.

So, the real reasons as to why india is out of the world cup are:

• Bermuda played badly in their match against Bangladesh. Their batting was horrible. The two dropped catches proved too costly for them and for India.
• Allison Leverock, the mother of Dwayne Leverock for having fed him so much food over the past few years. If only his mother had kept him on a diet, he would have been a few dozen kilos lighter and would have held more catches to help bermuda win against bangladesh.
• The chefs of the hotel where Bangladesh stayed. Their cooking was so bad that the Bangaldeshis skipped their dinner the night before their match with India. If only they had had their dinner, a few of them might have been down with food poisoning.
• The lack of good barbers in Port of Spain. Dhoni had commented that his hair had grown a little too long to manage and this had affected his game in the warm-up matches. So, Dhoni had planned to have a haircut in Port of Spain before the match against Bangladesh. But, all the barbers there only specialised in making curls out of the existing hair and none had ever heard of a haircut!
• Varuna, Zeus and Hobal, the rain gods for shedding their tears intermittently and not continuously during the bermuda bangladesh match. If only they had cried continuously, the bermuda cricketers might have known that the match was going to be reduced and slogged, rather than play like a test match.

What people also don't see is the benefit we get from the loss

• Poster makers have said that their profits have soared to never-seen-before levels after india's exit from the world cup. People are now buying posters of indian cricketers and burning them. More posters are being sold now compared to when india was performing well and winning matches
• Students will perform better in the board exams happening throughout the country now. Of course, under the assumption that it doesn't get postponed or cancelled because of protests or bandhs by political parties.
• Tamilians will not be killed in Karnataka. This is because, in tamil nadu, people will not watch matches and hence will have their TVs turned off, thus saving electricity in the state. Hence the state doesn't need more water in the Cauvery river to feed its hydro-electric projects.
• The Ad industry will have many openings, now that the cricketers will be kicked out of the ad campaigns.

So, ladies and gentlemen, bearded hosts of STAR news, 10-rupee an hour poster burners of political parties, don't blame the Indian cricketers for this loss. They were just playing their natural game. It was the others who weren't doing so, resulting in the indians' loss.

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India will win the ICC world cup

so says this email forward which got today. It also quotes various "mysterious" coincidences between India's world cup victory in 1983 and the current world cup. Btw, non-tamilians might not understand the dialogues in the pictures below.
I hope that i don't have to update this post after today's India-Sri Lanka match!

Update after the India-Sri Lanka match: Ok, The theories below have "almost" been proven wrong. "Almost" because, i still hope that today's Bangaldesh-Bermuda match has been fixed by the biggies at BCCI.

Trivia – 1
Year 1981
1. Prince Charles got married
2. Liverpool crowned Champions of Europe
3. Australia lost the Ashes
4. Pope Died
2 years later India won the Cricket world Cup!!!

Year 2005
1. Prince Charles got married
2. Liverpool crowned Champions of Europe
3. Australia lost the Ashes
4. Pope Died
2 years later Will India win the Cricket world Cup ?????

Trivia -2
1982 Football World Cup won by Italy
1983 Cricket World Cup won by India

2006 Football World Cup won by Italy
2007 Cricket World Cup will be won by India ??

Trivia -3
1983 Cricket World Cup India lost its first match by 5 wickets
2007 Cricket World Cup India lost its first match by 5 wickets



Haiyo!!! Haiyo!!!
Ippadiyae usuppethi usuppethi udamba ranakalama akkittanungappa!!!!
Innumada engala nambikkittirukinga?

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Dwayne Leverock, solid rock

Size does matter.

If anyone tries to convince you that it does not, show them the picture of this sumo-sized cricketer from Bermuda, Dwayne "sluggo" leverock. Weighing in at around 120 Kgs, just a look at him jogging in during his small run-up before he delivers his slow left-arm spinners would be enough to jitter even the best batsmen in the world. And it did!

Any bowler would be happy to get the wickets of Collingwood and Pietersen in a match. This is what Michael Vaughan had to say about leverock's performance:

He bowled very well. Any spinner that drags Kevin Pietersen out of his crease and does him in the flight - you know it's a good delivery.

His bowling figures of 2-32 in 10 overs might not have caught the attention of the world media, but his huge figure definitely has.

If the commentators go ga-ga when Anil Kumble "attempts" to field a ball in the most awkward position possible and applaud his commitment to the team etc, they should be at a loss for words to describe leverock's cricketing abilities. In spite of his size being a bit on the bigger side for a physically demanding sport, he has proved that he is a cricketer with all-round (no pun intended) capabilities.

How many international cricketers can take a catch like the one he took of Uthappa's ?

Take a look at his skills below: He comfortably takes a run, he is even able to field of his own bowling and a teammate is even able to lift him!

Arjuna Ranatunga showed the world that cricketing acumen would outscore physical fitness and Dwayne Leverock goes further to add more dimensions to this theory. Dwayne Leverock, the future of international cricket!

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